Kreis Enderle is a 50-year-old law firm with employees and attorneys who have been in their roles for a long time. In order to recruit new talent and compete in today’s marketplace, the firm recognized that it needed to: 1) establish standardized work processes, 2) better utilize the technologies they have already purchased, and 3) adopt secure practices for their clients’ sensitive data.

Solution

Kreis Enderle launched a culture-changing training program using the SavvyAcademy LMS.

Results

“Thanks to buy-in from firm leadership, we have experienced a shift in how people work and even how they see their roles at the firm. This training enables us to be uniform in how we work, so there is less customization, fewer opportunities for errors. It all supports our vision to create a solid foundation for future growth.” – Daniel J. Visscher, Assistant Controller & HR Manager

THE STORY

Kreis Enderle Hudgins & Borsos, P.C. is a 50-year-old law firm with offices in Kalamazoo, Grand Rapids and Battle Creek, Michigan. The firm includes 30 attorneys and 70 total employees, who work in multiple practice areas.

Recently, as firm leadership began setting a vision for the future, they realized that future growth demanded that they take a hard look at current processes.

“We have been around so long, and a lot of people have been in their roles so long, that many are caught up in doing things ‘the way I’ve always done it,’” says Daniel J. Visscher, Assistant Controller & HR Manager. “But when you have 70 people doing things their own way, it makes it very hard to grow and thrive as an organization.”

As an example, Visscher explained that the firm purchased the PerfectLaw ERP system seven years ago, but it is still not being fully utilized by staff. Also, people each have their own way of filing documents using the system.

“We were facing operational headaches with staff turnover because we couldn’t find where things were located. Issues cost time and time is money,” says Visscher.

Visscher knew that he needed to offer training on everything from PerfectLaw to Word to security awareness, but he didn’t have the bandwidth to create, launch and manage all the trainings and learning content on his own.

He heard about the SavvyAcademy LMS from another firm, checked it out, and immediately knew it was what he needed to achieve his ambitious goals. He explained his ideas to Kreis Enderle leadership and they embraced the plan.

Visscher also recruited the firm’s Collection Manager, Rebecca A. Robertson, to help implement the training program and create firm-specific training content. (The SavvyAcademy LMS comes fully loaded with the SavvySMART Content Library, but Robertson also creates content for niche needs.) Her title changed to Collections and Education Manager.

Then, on September 9, 2019, Visscher and Robertson launched the LMS and assigned learning goals to all firm staff. The assignments even came with incentives for those who completed their courses by the end of December 2019.

Every single staff member hit their training goals.

Throughout the process, Robertson made it her mission to listen to users and send them links to existing SavvySMART courses that could serve their needs, and she personally developed specialized content for unique training requests.

“A lot of my focus is on our database and general office procedures,” says Robertson. “For example, I created training content on how to use our phone system.”

She also uses the LMS to deliver help desk training.

“If people reach out and they need help with redlining or tracking changes, I just say, ‘OK, I’ll look up a course for you!’ and I send them a link. Also, if people are constantly asking the same question, I can email the firm about an appropriate course or I can create a course.”

Visscher says that the firm has set new goals for 2020.

“This year, we expect people to complete 24 courses,” he explains. “We will enroll them in 12 courses based on what we think they should take, including specific technology rollouts that we have planned this year. For the other 12 courses, they can choose what they take, because they’ll know if they need more Excel or Word or Nuance PDF.”

Visscher also hopes to launch training for attorneys in 2020, though he admits that it could be a bigger challenge.

“The best incentive we can offer attorneys is for them to see management leading by example and taking courses themselves,” says Visscher. “When the managing partner says, ‘I’m doing this,’ it sends a clear message that this is a firm priority.”

Overall, Visscher and Robertson believe the SavvyAcademy LMS has been tremendously successful.

“Thanks to buy-in from firm leadership, we have experienced a shift in how people work and even how they see their roles at the firm,” says Visscher. “This training enables us to be uniform in how we work, so there is less customization, fewer opportunities for errors. It all supports our vision to create a solid foundation for future growth.”